Gay rights and Muslim rights

Inayat Bunglawala, commentisfree.guardian.co.uk from the Web, May 9, 2007

It's been a week now since the new sexual orientation regulations came into effect in mainland UK as part of the Equality Act 2006.  The Equality Act brought the goal of a fairer society closer by proscribing -- for the first time -- discrimination in the provision of goods and services on the grounds of religious belief or sexuality.

Brian Whitaker noted on Cif last week that the Muslim Council of Britain has "formally declared its support for the new Equality Act", but what has been the response of other UK Muslims?

It is still early days, but I wanted to share with you a couple of responses I have received from two British Muslims who were clearly unhappy.

The first is from Dr Abdul Majid Katme who sent his complaint to a number of figures in the UK Muslim community, including me:

MCB has given in to the homosexual lobby ... A Muslim printer will be taken to court now if he refuses to print a leaflet on homosexuality ... A Muslim owner of a hotel/bed and breakfast will be taken to court now if he refuses to offer a room to two homosexuals to sleep the night together.

The second response is from a British convert to Islam, Daoud Rosser-Owen, who had also received Dr Katme's email:

I agree with everything that you wrote in protest at the caving in of the MCB to the homosexualists' lobby, and I feel that the Christian organisations will certainly feel let down.

Now, let's just take a look again at the quality of the arguments that have been presented above in opposition to the regulations.  The arguments are in fact quite similar to those made by a senior figure from the Lawyers' Christian Fellowship in a letter to the Times a few days ago who called for an exemption to be included in the regulations:

The exemption sought by Christians is simply to prevent them being forced to act against their conscience by having to actively facilitate or promote the practice of homosexuality.

Such an exemption need not unduly affect the rights of homosexuals.  An example would be a Christian who owned a small printing business.  If a restaurant owner, who was a homosexual, wanted him to print some menus, he would not wish or be able to refuse on the ground of the restaurant owner's homosexuality.  However, if he were asked to print leaflets which promoted the practice of homosexuality he would be able to refuse.  The printer is not forced to act against his conscience and beliefs; the client remains free to go to any other printer who does not hold such beliefs.

You only need to give this scenario a moment's thought to recognise the quite bizarre situations that could ensue if we happened to follow that line of thought.

For example, let's go back to our two emailers.  How would they respond if, say, a Christian printer used the sought-after exemption to refuse to print a pamphlet about Islam because he did not share the beliefs expressed in it?  Or if a Christian hotel owner turned a Muslim couple away because the sight of a lady wearing the hijab was offensive to him?  In order to be consistent they would have to accept the right of Christians to discriminate in the services they claim to offer to the public.  The Equality Act enables Muslims to challenge these actions on grounds of religious discrimination.

Why should gay people be denied similar protection in law?

The act does not in any way compel believers to change their views about the practice of homosexuality as being against the teachings of their religion.  As the MCB noted in its statement:

We affirm our belief that the practice and promotion of homosexuality is forbidden according to the teachings of Islam.

However, the Equality Act rightly insists that if someone wants to provide goods and services to the public, then they should do so without discrimination on grounds of ethnic background, faith or sexual orientation.

(Emphasis from original posting.)

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